Thursday, January 17, 2013

African Adventure, part 10

One of our family traditions, since having speaking children, was to name our vehicles. Tom told the kids that we were ready to load up the Patrol, and Meghan heard "Troll." Hence the new moniker for our trusty transport. Here after to be known and referred to at the "Trol." I opted to drop the extra "L" since it is a Nissan Patrol. Our Trol is slow to accelerate, has "warts", is strong, sturdy, and not exactly pretty to look at.

Loading up the Trol ...

As soon as we finished up, the rain began to gently fall. We drove over to the office, checked out their "Adventure Desk", gathered brochures to entice friends and family to visit, and left down this muddy road back to Livingstone and then home.

By the time we reached Livingstone the rain was fairly steady. If you can see it, here are the "warts" of our Trol. The dashboard is sun baked, and bubbled.

Our road back to Lusaka was uneventful, though every 50 kilometers or so we noticed another degeneration of the road. This is a passenger train! We have driven over several rail crossings since we moved, but this is the first time we have witnessed that the tracks are still being used. Zambia had a fully functioning passenger rail service at one time, but apparently it is now limited to a small region south of Lusaka.

New constructions in both of these photos.

Life goes on the same for everyone, including laundry drying in the sun.

This was a work crew setting up new telephone poles ... no equipment except picks, shovels and strong backs!

What locals do when they don't have a truck! We spied this car, loaded with a new refrigerator, as we got closer to Lusaka.

Our stay Saturday night in Lusaka was once again at Bob and Mary's home. Their little dog, Nick, kept us company, and we sure wished we could bring him back to Chingola with us!

Saturday we all enjoyed great dinners at Spurs at the Mandahill Mall. No photos ...

The next morning we attended Mass at the Catholic Cathedral ... photos courtesy of Kate.

This is the lectern .. neat drums!!

We are not entirely certain what this sculpture was for. Quite obviously, it is of some importance. Advent candles, as this was the 4th Sunday of Advent.

This delighted us, to discover we were walking in the same place that Pope John Paul II did!

During the announcements each small Christian community was reminded to care for their portion of the parish grounds. No professional lawn crews here!

Here is Mary, Meghan, Yvonne and Tom heading into Mass.

Greeter waiting at the door. The women here wear colorful wrap skirts that are emblazoned with the small faith group they belong to. The same with several of the men's shirts. This woman stayed after Mass to visit and welcome us!

After a very nice breakfast at the Mint Cafe, we loaded up and started the long drove back north to Chingola. And that is when disaster struck. Before I get that posted, enjoy some of the photos pre-disaster:

Kate managed to "catch" part of Peter in this shot. He is photo shy, hence why so few of him on our trip. This is at one of the bus "stations", a vendor hawking bags of chips to passengers.

Contrast of a roadside stall with a new school

Bathroom break at "Tony's".. The Goofy sign tickled our funny bones.

Another full view of the new school, plus some of the few "mountains" on our journey back home.

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Livin' the High LIfe!

New transitions .. learning to live apart from my dear husband .. then learning to live with him when he is home on leave .. plenty of time for the house .. teaching math in college .. falling more in love with God .. discerning the "next step"